The High Court of Australia unanimously held that the search warrant relied upon by the Australian Federal Police to enter and search the residence of journalist, Ms Annika Smethurst, was invalid. The invalidity of the search warrant rendered the AFP's entry into and search of Ms Smethurst's residence unlawful and an act of trespass.
Read MoreThe Australian Institute for Progress (AIP), a think tank based in Queensland, sought declaration from the Queensland Supreme Court that due to ordinary rules of statutory interpretation, it was able to accept political donations from property developers.
Read MoreComcare v Banerji [2019] HCA 23
In a recent case, the High Court of Australia has confirmed there is not an unfettered right to the implied freedom of political communication and that Australian Public Service (APS) employees must at all times behave in a way that upholds the values of the APS, which extends to comments made anonymously on social media.
Read MoreThe High Court (the Court) upheld the validity of Queensland anti-corruption measures which prohibit the making of political donations by property developers. The decision supports legislative efforts to improve transparency and accountability in electoral funding. However, it may also be seen as giving permission to parliaments to ban political donations from certain classes of donors even where strong evidence of corruption is lacking.
Read MoreIn this landmark decision, the High Court upheld the constitutional validity of safe access zone laws in Victoria and Tasmania, in particular, provisions that prohibit certain communications and protests about abortion within 150 metres of abortion clinics.
Read MoreOn 5 March 2019, the European Court of Human Rights (First Section) (the Court) declared inadmissible the applications of eight individuals who claimed that their arrests and subsequent detentions in London during Prince William and Catherine Middleton's wedding were a breach of their rights to liberty and security under art 5(1) of the European Convention on Human Rights (the Convention).
Read MoreThe High Court of Australia unanimously held that a NSW law that imposed a lower cap on the allowable electoral expenditure for third party campaigners compared with expenditure allowed for political parties and candidates was unconstitutional, as it impermissibly burdened the implied freedom of political communication.
Read MoreThe European Court of Human Rights has found that Russia breached human rights conventions in the prosecution and imprisonment of feminist protest band Pussy Riot.
Read MoreBoehringer Ingelheim Limited & Ors v Vetplus Limited [2007] EWCA Civ 583 (20 June 2007) Canada (Attorney General) v JTI-Macdonald Corp 2007 SCC 30 (28 June 2007)
The scope and application of the right to freedom of expression in a commercial context has recently been considered by the UK Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada. While neither court recognised a ‘corporate right’ to freedom of expression, both cases held that the right may be engaged by expression about commercial matters and, moreover, that the public have a prima facie right to ‘hear’ the expression (as opposed to a corporation having a right to ‘express’ the information).
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